Japanese Folk Tale

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Preface
ment official, he still had a way of meeting farmers man to man. He
sat by their open hearths to exchange views on their problems, to
sample their local foods with a relish, and to listen to their dialect
and legends. Yanagita established the habit early in his work of taking
down detailed notes on what he saw and heard and making entries in
his diary. These notes provided the basis for his many lectures and
articles.
The young official also had literary talent. He had begun to publish
his poems when he was sixteen years old. He belonged to a group
of young writers who were interested in current literature both at
home and in Europe. He had a good reading command of English and
French and could get along with German and Dutch. In 1907 Yanagita
helped found the Ibsen Society of Japan. It was his interest in poetry
which led him first to the folk tale. He had noticed some poems of
Sasaki Kyoseki (later called Sasaki Kizen), who was a student at Waseda
University. Yanagita arranged a meeting with him. Sasaki told
Yanagita at that time some tales and legends that had been handed
down in his family in Tono. Yanagita was struck by the unmistakable
traces of old Japanese beliefs in the tales. He resolved to investigate
them further. He took the opportunity when he visited Tono later to
hear more tales. The result was Tono monogatari (Tono tales), which
he published in 1910.2 Yanagi ta then encouraged Sasaki to collect
other folk tales in his area and made it possible for him to publish
them.
Two of Yanagita's friends, Ishii Kendo and Takagi Toshio, then set
out to gather tales. Ishii published his Nippon zenkoku kokumin do wa
(All-Japan stories for children)3 in 1911, attributing each story to
some old province in the country. Takagi, who was on the staff of the
newspaper Asahi Shinbun, advertised in it for tales and took time to
edit what came in. He published his Nihon densetsu shu (Japanese
legends)4 in 1913. Here we see the pattern of Yanagita's ability to
enlist others to join his efforts.
Yanagita and Takagi started the journal Kyodo kenkyu (Local
studies) in 1912. This publication provided an outlet for information
about life in all corners of Japan. Many men with whom Yanagita had
made contacts earlier now provided information about folkloristic
topics, including folk tales. The journal had to be suspended after four
years because the work of the two young editors had changed, but
during that interval it had received items from 200 contributors. They
lived in Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka or Hokkaido, and in thirty-eight prefectures,
as well as in Korea, China and Formosa.
Yanagi ta was appointed Chief Secretary to the House of Peers in
1914 and held that position until 1919. He went to Geneva in 1921
with the official group of observers from Japan to the League of
Nations, serving in that capacity for nearly two years. When he
returned to Japan, he joined the editorial staff of Asahi Shinbun. In
the meantime, his interest in folklore and folk tales grew. He invited a
number of men, including Sasaki Kizen, to contribute to Rohen sosho
(Hearth-side series), some forty little books on folklore and folk tales
from Hokkaido in the north to the Marianas in the south. By 1930
Yanagita was able to select a representative body of folk tales for
publication. His Nihon no mukashibanashi, jo (Japanese Folk Tales, Vol.